By Terry Witt -Spotlight Senior Reporter

            Levy County’s two most powerful political boards, the county commission, and school board are being asked to approve identical boundary lines for the districts their members represent and it could happen with relatively little political pain.

            Or it could get messy. It all depends.

            The process of redistricting, which involves the redrawing of district lines based on population growth is tethered to the U.S. Census count once every 10 years, but the procedure was complicated this year by efforts to give both boards the same boundary lines and therefore identical districts and district numbers.

            In the past, the school board drew their own district lines independently of the county commission, but Supervisor of Elections Tammy Jones asked both boards to adopt the same district boundaries this year to eliminate confusion among voters.

            “She had some feedback about why is my county commissioner in district 4, but my school board member is in District 2,” said School Superintendent Chris Cowart.

            John Gilreath, office manager for DRMP in Gainesville and a Geographic Information Systems Professional has been hired by the two boards to redraw district lines and get input from the two boards and the public.

            Gilreath gave a presentation to the school board on Oct. 12 in which he laid out four options for redrawing school board district and county commission district lines. Option A is probably the most appealing.

            Option A draws the boundary lines very close to those of the current county commission and school board district boundaries, keeping at least one major city in each district as required by state law and retaining the primary schools in each district, but with four of the five school board districts getting new district numbers.

• District 1 Board Member Cameron Asbell would continue to represent Bronson and serve the Town of Bronson, Bronson Middle High School and Bronson Elementary School, according to Cowart. Asbell represents District 1 and County Commissioner John Meeks represents District 1.
• School Board District 2 member Tammy Boyle would continue to serve Cedar Key School but she would change her district number to 4 to match County Commissioner Lilly Rooks.
• School Board District 4 member Paige Brookins would continue to serve Chiefland Elementary School and Chiefland Middle High School but she would change her district number to 2 to match the District of County Commissioner Rock Meeks.
• School Board member Brad Etheridge would continue to serve District 3 including Williston Middle High School, Williston Elementary School and Joyce Bullock Elementary but he would swap district numbers with District 5 School Board member Ashley Clemenzi to match county commission districts. Etheridge would take District 5 and Clemenzi would take District 3, which includes Yankeetown School in her district.

            Former Levy County Commissioner Mike Joyner, who represented District 3, has passed away. The governor will choose his replacement. Clemenzi’s district and district number would match Joyner’s. County Commissioner Matt Brooks represents District 5 and he and Etheridge would share the same district number.

            Cowart said there are some changes in district lines.

            “It does move the district lines due to population growth but yes, that’s the closest to what the lines are now that have the schools they associate within their district,” Cowart said.

            The largest gains in population were in Williston, Southwest Levy County, and south of Chiefland. Gilreath said much of the population gains resulted from migration from Marion and Citrus Counties into Levy County.

            Cowart plans to bring the district number changes back to the school board at its next meeting. He said school board members can approve or disapprove the changes.

            “That will be at the discretion of the board to move forward with that,” Cowart said.

            Gilreath said state law forbids the county to redraw district lines that would remove an elected official from their district.

            One of the points made by school board members at the Oct. 12 meeting is that they weren’t interested in having the lines redrawn to move them away from the schools they traditionally have represented.

            School Board Chairman Cameron Asbell said he couldn’t support Option C for that reason.

            “Any of these options works for District 1 (Asbell’s district). Option 3, I do not like. I know we represent all the schools. We’re elected to represent all the schools. There’s no school for Paige Brookins (in Option C). If you ask someone in the general public what school do you represent, Brad represents Williston, Paige represents Chiefland, so I think it is important to keep a school mapped into their districts. Yes, I have no problem if people call me and ask a question, but I think it’s important; it may not line up with the county commission, but we are two completely different operations. I think it’s important, however, we go with a school in each of the districts.”

            Etheridge asked if school board members could talk individually with county commissioners about the redistricting issues. Gilreath said he preferred that school board members and county commissioners communicate through their respective administrators.

            “The way it works on my end, the communication comes through the superintendent just like with the county, the communication comes through the county coordinator. I’m not talking directly to the board. I’m essentially staff, so I’ll take direction from them,” he said.

            “I’ll just say it’s an awesome task you are doing,” Etheridge said. “The students have different identities that operate in different scenarios and drawing lines that make it palatable to everyone.”

            Gilreath is hosting five workshops to take public input. The first occurred at Rosewood Baptist Church. The second is on Monday, Oct. 18 at Inglis Community Center. The third is at Tommy Usher Center in Chiefland on Oct. 25, the fourth at Williston Municipal Complex on Nov. 1, and the final workshop is at the Levy County Government Center. All workshops start at 6 p.m.

            He said he is also establishing interactive sites on the school board and county commission websites that allow people to browse through the four options and see the maps.

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School Board of Levy County Regular Meeting October 12, 2021; Posted October 17, 2021